Although quasars are light days across, they are billions of light years from Earth, which means that most of what scientists know about them comes from extrapolations and not direct evidence.
FORBES: Hubble Telescope Observes Matter Falling Into Black Hole
After all, they are making billions of dollars in selling raw materials and precious metals to the West.
They are investing billions of dollars in technology that will change the world, including your particular part of it.
States and municipalities cry that because of purchases being made on the Internet they are losing billions of dollars every year in tax receipts.
The common explanation from banks is that they are losing billions of dollars in revenue from the Durbin Amendment which basically cut the interchange fee on debit card transactions in half.
FORBES: Will Debit Fees Push Consumers Back To Credit Cards?
These CMEs can be even more disruptive because they are capable of sending billions of tonnes of charged gas and other particles into space.
But oil companies are likely to invest less in boosting production if they are forced to divert billions of dollars toward reverse-engineering a smaller pipeline.
So how are they going to raise the billions they need?
FORBES: Golden Spike Aims To Take The World To The Moon - For $750M Per Ticket
Does that mean they are now ready to package hundreds of billions in tax hikes with spending cuts to make a deficit deal?
FORBES: Republican Senators Prove They Can Vote To Raise Taxes
While poles may seem like a particularly unproductive way to spend billions of dollars, they are chump change economically speaking, given the sudden surge in infrastructure investment in response to the decades of historical under-investment.
The current governor of the Bank of England seems to believe that the best hope is to force the banks to recognise properly the losses they are likely to make on tens of billions of pounds of loans to over-extended borrowers, households and businesses, and then force the banks to rebuild their loss-absorbing capacity by raising new capital.
If it cannot, they are likely to reach into the tens of billions.
Sports fans may project an all-American image of baseball and apple pie, but they are bilking most of the population out of billions of dollars every year.
However, most businesses cannot grow their earnings at such high rates of return (26.3%) for a decade, especially when they are beginning at an earnings base in the billions, as is Apple.
FORBES: Look Closer At The PEG Ratio And Apple Isn't Such A Bargain
Not addressed by either Bush or O'Neil is who is going to get these additional billions, or even what exactly they are supposed to do.
The banks, as counterparties, are on the hook for billions in insurance they bought to hedge credit-derivatives positions.
So you got this middle man and they get billions of dollars per year managing loans that are guaranteed by the federal government.
WHITEHOUSE: President Obama Holds a Town Hall in New Hampshire
And I think some executives were on the Hill today testifying from the oil companies, and I just would note that some executives of those oil companies in the past have made clear that they, too, believe that they do not need the subsidies that are provided in the billions of dollars from American taxpayers to their companies.
Look at what iPod has done for Apple's capitalization--Apple shareholders are tens of billions of dollars richer today than they were before iPod.
The politicians believe they'll collect tens of billions of dollars in taxes that are already owed by shoppers on remote sales but rarely paid.
Simply, because under the Constitution, state governments have authority over water resources -- and they are loath to give it up to the feds because they earn billions from water charges.
Given the democratization and globalization of innovation seen in recent years, companies must be allowed to tap freely into the brainpower of billions of innovators-in-waiting worldwide if they are to remain competitive.
These guys are traders and the same risk taking they used to make millions (billions) will either set them free, minimize their prison time or send them to prison for decades.
FORBES: The Arrest of Michael Steinberg Brings New Dynamic to SAC Investigation
Apple and other U.S. corporations have piled up tens of billions of dollars in foreign profits in those units that they are loathe to bring home and subject to U.S. taxes.
FORBES: Tax Case Asks Whether IRS Flip-Flopped On Key Position
McCaskill question whether U.S. military operations benefit from spending billions of dollars on major infrastructure projects that often fail when they are turned over to local officials.
Already, all major pharmaceutical companies are spending billions of dollars in research and development for every drug they manage to get to market, and the discovery effort is only getting more expensive.
FORBES: First-Ever Forbes Health Care Conference To Focus On Transparency And Transformation
It is positioned to benefit from the billions governments worldwide are spending to build and upgrade electrical grids so they can handle intermittent sources along with higher demand.
Bangalore took nearly two decades to get to this place, but Mahathir and Li are hoping that, by spending billions of dollars on infrastructure development, they can cover that ground in a couple of years.
CNN: ASIANOW - TIME Asia | Subcontinental Drift: The Original Cybercity
They just voted to keep billions of dollars of taxpayer subsidies to big oil companies who are raking in record profits.
WHITEHOUSE: President Obama Speaks on Student Loan Interest Rates in Colorado | The White House
What we have talked about is that starting in 2013, that we have gotten rid of some of these egregious loopholes that are benefiting corporate jet owners or oil companies at a time where they're making billions of dollars of profits.
WHITEHOUSE: President Obama��s News Conference on Deficit Reduction
应用推荐